TfW DMU Availability

[AgeoftheTrain7]

I apologise if this starts another thread like the TfW Overcrowding one (recently closed), but just wanted to make the point that TfW are running single car Class 153 units all the way from Cardiff Central to Holyhead...

A lot of this is probably to do with the Craven Arms fire, and I know there will be new trains soon.

Anyway, hopefully RTT is wrong, as I'm about to get on this train...

Realtime Trains | 1W93 1122 Cardiff Central to Holyhead | 01/06/2022

Real-time train running information for 1W93 1122 departure from Cardiff Central to Holyhead on 01/06/2022. From Realtime Trains, an independent source of train running info for Great Britain.

www.realtimetrains.co.uk

I'll let you know!

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 1 Jun 2022 ==

Sorry! RTT is now reporting two 153s joined together, but I promise it was one before!

 

[Halish Railway]

It’s showing as a pair of 153s now. That is a 67+Mk4 diagram so it’ll be down to the unavailability of them or a lack of train crew that is trained on either.

I think this exact scenario has happened before, with the 153s struggling to keep to time.

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

2x153 is a poor show, and the legroom is awful, but the number of seats won't be a lot different to the current Mk4 sets.
The Mk4s have one 1st class coach and half of another is the buffet, leaving 2.5 for standard class.
The DVT and loco look impressive but don't offer any seats.

 

[hexagon789]

I apologise if this starts another thread like the TfW Overcrowding one (recently closed), but just wanted to make the point that TfW are running single car Class 153 units all the way from Cardiff Central to Holyhead...

A lot of this is probably to do with the Craven Arms fire, and I know there will be new trains soon.

Anyway, hopefully RTT is wrong, as I'm about to get on this train...

Realtime Trains | 1W93 1122 Cardiff Central to Holyhead | 01/06/2022

Real-time train running information for 1W93 1122 departure from Cardiff Central to Holyhead on 01/06/2022. From Realtime Trains, an independent source of train running info for Great Britain.

www.realtimetrains.co.uk

I'll let you know!

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 1 Jun 2022 ==

Sorry! RTT is now reporting two 153s joined together, but I promise it was one before!

There was a thread about this sort of thing not that long ago:

1122 Cardiff - Holyhead today (01/02/22) operated by a pair of 153s? (TfW Premier Service issues)

Just seen today's 1W93 on RTT: https://www.realtimetrains.co.uk/service/gb-nr:P21389/2022-02-01/detailed#allox_id=0 Do TFW have a problem with the MkIV sets? This is normally a loco hauled train.

railforums.co.uk

 

[SuperLuke2334]

I apologise if this starts another thread like the TfW Overcrowding one (recently closed), but just wanted to make the point that TfW are running single car Class 153 units all the way from Cardiff Central to Holyhead...

A lot of this is probably to do with the Craven Arms fire, and I know there will be new trains soon.

Anyway, hopefully RTT is wrong, as I'm about to get on this train...

Realtime Trains | 1W93 1122 Cardiff Central to Holyhead | 01/06/2022

Real-time train running information for 1W93 1122 departure from Cardiff Central to Holyhead on 01/06/2022. From Realtime Trains, an independent source of train running info for Great Britain.

www.realtimetrains.co.uk

I'll let you know!

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 1 Jun 2022 ==

Sorry! RTT is now reporting two 153s joined together, but I promise it was one before!

This will be unconnected as it is booked a 67/Mk4 set. The lack of the 150s will not affect this, it will either be due to lack of staff or lack of the stock ready and prepared to work it.

 

[robrymond]

There was a problem with the 17.20 service from Crewe today. There was a 150 sat at Platform 8 and then it went off and we got told there was a train fault. I only wanted to go to Nantwich which is an 8 minute ride but the next one was 18.12. I ended up asking to be released from the station to get a lift as the bus also takes a stupid amount of time.

What was frustrating was the Manchester Pic to Shrewsbury non-stopper was just leaving and they didn't think to do extra stops!

 

[wobman]

There was a problem with the 17.20 service from Crewe today. There was a 150 sat at Platform 8 and then it went off and we got told there was a train fault. I only wanted to go to Nantwich which is an 8 minute ride but the next one was 18.12. I ended up asking to be released from the station to get a lift as the bus also takes a stupid amount of time.

What was frustrating was the Manchester Pic to Shrewsbury non-stopper was just leaving and they didn't think to do extra stops!

It's unfortunately what happens with having such an old fleet of trains, most of tfws units were built in the 1980s and 1990s then newest units 175s are over 20yrs old now.

As a result reliability suffers and have so few units there's no spare units available as unit replacements, from experience tfw are struggling with unit reliability which always worsens in the warm weather. Tfw are trying to get more units until the 197s come into service, they are sourcing more Mk4s but it all takes time.

Looking at the DFT and previous govt decisions will show the reasons for the problems tfw are experiencing now, giving atw a non growth franchise was the start of it all and no new units for over 20yrs !

 

[Towers]

It's unfortunately what happens with having such an old fleet of trains, most of tfws units were built in the 1980s and 1990s then newest units 175s are over 20yrs old now.

As a result reliability suffers and have so few units there's no spare units available as unit replacements, from experience tfw are struggling with unit reliability which always worsens in the warm weather. Tfw are trying to get more units until the 197s come into service, they are sourcing more Mk4s but it all takes time.

In fairness, there are plenty of newer trains that are unreliable too! A 150 is a decent old barge and they're in everyday use at various TOCs of course.

I said it before and I'll repeat, the decision to withdraw the Pacers at TfW without replacement was an utterly silly one and should have been deferred. There was a clear need, and their loss was very obviously going to lead to the capacity issues we see today. Arrangements should have been made for them to remain in service as required, obviously albeit only attached to a suitably accessible unit.

That is all!

 

[wobman]

In fairness, there are plenty of newer trains that are unreliable too! A 150 is a decent old barge and they're in everyday use at various TOCs of course.

I said it before and I'll repeat, the decision to withdraw the Pacers at TfW without replacement was an utterly silly one and should have been deferred. There was a clear need, and their loss was very obviously going to lead to the capacity issues we see today. Arrangements should have been made for them to remain in service as required, obviously albeit only attached to a suitably accessible unit.

That is all!

In tfws defence there were some extra rolling stock planned such as the 230's & 769s but they have proven to be a terrible choice. One type in service but very temperamental the other type still sitting in some sidings after a 3yr delay.

The accessibility ♿️ issue is one that's difficult with a pacer as they have no through corridors to access the toilet in the added unit.

The sprinters are and have been great units but with them being so old it's just inevitable reliability suffers, I was on a job the other day & the sprinters were falling all over due to the heat unfortunately. Its just wear & tear I think & they are great servants to the railways

 

[Watershed]

In tfws defence there were some extra rolling stock planned such as the 230's & 769s but they have proven to be a terrible choice. One type in service but very temperamental the other type still sitting in some sidings after a 3yr delay.

To be fair, that was all pretty foreseeable even at the ordering stage. And by the point the decision was taken not to extend the Pacers' PRM derogation, there was absolutely no doubt as to the 230/769s' shocking unreliability.

 

[mmh]

2x153 is a poor show, and the legroom is awful, but the number of seats won't be a lot different to the current Mk4 sets.
The Mk4s have one 1st class coach and half of another is the buffet, leaving 2.5 for standard class.
The DVT and loco look impressive but don't offer any seats.

There's actually quite a difference despite there only being 2.5 coaches of standard on the current Mark 4 sets.

A pair of 153s has 118 seats (according to Wikipedia)

The Mk4s have 174 standard class seats (or 182 if there's no universal toilet in standard on them - which I think there is but I've never used it) (According to LNER seat maps)

The 153s have an awful, cramped seat layout but also have a lot of "dead" space with all the cabs, toilets etc which the Mark 4s of course don't.

 

[Towers]

In tfws defence there were some extra rolling stock planned such as the 230's & 769s but they have proven to be a terrible choice. One type in service but very temperamental the other type still sitting in some sidings after a 3yr delay.

The accessibility ♿️ issue is one that's difficult with a pacer as they have no through corridors to access the toilet in the added unit.

The sprinters are and have been great units but with them being so old it's just inevitable reliability suffers, I was on a job the other day & the sprinters were falling all over due to the heat unfortunately. Its just wear & tear I think & they are great servants to the railways

Interesting point about the gangways, but of course being in the 'wrong' coach of a modded 150 would present the same issues in many cases, so I don't think that really offers a complete excuse! It's easily worked-around by having a well publicised system of clearly advertising externally where the accessible area is. Pacer withdrawal was driven by politics and little else, common sense had very little to do with it!

Failing in the heat, especially at the start of the warmer months, can be something as straightforward as the radiators not having been cleaned properly in anticipation of the warm weather, but I agree they're certainly no spring chickens!

 

[DelW]

Interesting point about the gangways, but of course being in the 'wrong' coach of a modded 150 would present the same issues in many cases, so I don't think that really offers a complete excuse! It's easily worked-around by having a well publicised system of clearly advertising externally where the accessible area is. Pacer withdrawal was driven by politics and little else, common sense had very little to do with it!

The gangways argument is surely a bit of a red herring, as long as there's enough space in the accessible unit for anyone who needs its facilities to travel on it. Even on many modern units, e.g. wheelchair users have to travel in the same coach as the accessible toilet as aisles and gangways may not be wide enough for them to get through.
An attached Pacer would have been sub-optimal, but I'm sure most passengers would have preferred to travel in that rather than be left behind on the platform.

 

[Bikeman78]

Interesting point about the gangways, but of course being in the 'wrong' coach of a modded 150 would present the same issues in many cases, so I don't think that really offers a complete excuse!

Agreed. If someone in a wheelchair wishes to use the toilet then they have only one door available on a class 150. If they have no need to use the toilet then a Pacer is no different. I have seen dozens of people in wheelchairs on Pacers over the years. By contrast, guess how many wheelchairs I have seen on compliant DOO rolling stock around London... How exactly is someone supposed to get on or off at an unstaffed station?

 

[mmh]

The gangways argument is surely a bit of a red herring, as long as there's enough space in the accessible unit for anyone who needs its facilities to travel on it. Even on many modern units, e.g. wheelchair users have to travel in the same coach as the accessible toilet as aisles and gangways may not be wide enough for them to get through.
An attached Pacer would have been sub-optimal, but I'm sure most passengers would have preferred to travel in that rather than be left behind on the platform.

The universal toilets are of use to people not in wheelchairs, though. On many trains they provide the only usable place for baby changing, for example. It's a failing that in many cases refurbishment of old trains hasn't touched the non-accessible trains to add facilities to do so. In the scheme of things the cost would be nothing.

 

[DelW]

The universal toilets are of use to people not in wheelchairs, though. On many trains they provide the only usable place for baby changing, for example. It's a failing that in many cases refurbishment of old trains hasn't touched the non-accessible trains to add facilities to do so. In the scheme of things the cost would be nothing.

I wasn't suggesting that any trains should be run without accessible facilities. What I'm suggesting is that had TfW kept the Pacers a bit longer, it could have been possible to add a non-accessible unit to an overloaded accessible train, to avoid having to leave passengers behind. Reducing the overcrowding would make it easier for anyone who needed to, to use the accessible toilet as well.

 

[wobman]

Agreed. If someone in a wheelchair wishes to use the toilet then they have only one door available on a class 150. If they have no need to use the toilet then a Pacer is no different. I have seen dozens of people in wheelchairs on Pacers over the years. By contrast, guess how many wheelchairs I have seen on compliant DOO rolling stock around London... How exactly is someone supposed to get on or off at an unstaffed station?

You will find there disabled seating area is in the same coach as the accessible toilet on a 150 & most rolling stock for that very reason, regarding the pacers they had no retention tanks fitted and had accessibility problems for disabled passengers. Plus pacers were life expired units and many were not in a good state of repair if you asked maintenance staff.

 

[wobman]

I wasn't suggesting that any trains should be run without accessible facilities. What I'm suggesting is that had TfW kept the Pacers a bit longer, it could have been possible to add a non-accessible unit to an overloaded accessible train, to avoid having to leave passengers behind. Reducing the overcrowding would make it easier for anyone who needed to, to use the accessible toilet as well.

The new tfw tram trains don't have toilets and will run along the valleys, tfw are planning to have toilet facilities at certain unmanned stations.
Maybe the toilet facilities could have been installed whilst the pacers were on the route & then they could have run until the tram trains come into service

 

[mmh]

Maybe the toilet facilities could have been installed whilst the pacers were on the route & then they

The toilet facilities won't be installed.

 

[wobman]

The toilet facilities won't be installed.

There will be toilet facilities at stations on the valleys lines, this is whilst the new tram trains go into service and run on the route.
The tram trains won't have toilets fitted unlike the present rolling stock that run on the route.

 

[mmh]

There will be toilet facilities at stations on the valleys lines, this is whilst the new tram trains go into service and run on the route.
The tram trains won't have toilets fitted unlike the present rolling stock that run on the route.

Good luck with that, they said the same when 376s were ordered.

 

[wobman]

Good luck with that, they said the same when 376s were ordered.

It was posted in a Wales online article a few months ago, tfw have said this is the plan on the valleys network

 

[Llandudno]

TfW have announced that there will be no trains today or tomorrow between Llandudno and Blaenau Ffestiniog and that the Wrexham - Bidston service will only be operating every 2 hours.

No reason given, although I suspect that they have reallocated the units to Cardiff for the football?

£millions spent on repairing the Conwy Valley line in recent years including not running trains for the best part of a year, and now on primarily a leisure based route, trains are withdrawn over a bank holiday weekend…

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 4 Jun 2022 ==

TfW have announced that there will be no trains today or tomorrow between Llandudno and Blaenau Ffestiniog and that the Wrexham - Bidston service will only be operating every 2 hours.

No reason given, although I suspect that they have reallocated the units to Cardiff for the football?

£millions spent on repairing the Conwy Valley line in recent years including not running trains for the best part of a year, and now on primarily a leisure based route, trains are withdrawn over a bank holiday weekend…

Update, trains have appeared this afternoon on the Conwy Valley Line…!

 

[hooverboy]

In fairness, there are plenty of newer trains that are unreliable too! A 150 is a decent old barge and they're in everyday use at various TOCs of course.

I said it before and I'll repeat, the decision to withdraw the Pacers at TfW without replacement was an utterly silly one and should have been deferred. There was a clear need, and their loss was very obviously going to lead to the capacity issues we see today. Arrangements should have been made for them to remain in service as required, obviously albeit only attached to a suitably accessible unit.

That is all!

The decision to scrap the pacres was not entirely TFW's making.
Ultimately the DFT gave the edict that all stock had to be PRM compliant by a set date,and there was a lot of can-kicking by all parties who should have either ordered new stock or made the necessary adjustments a lot sooner.

Having a 153 attached to a compliant unit would have doubled up on existing duties,thereby reducing the amount of operational trains in service,and reducing revenue generation due to excess capacity on those diagrams.
A lot of these branch services are run on a shoestring at best of times, hence the requirement for either the single 153 or pacer to start with.

Somebody really did need to bite the bullet,and either get the 14x evolutions, or put in an order for a no-frills PRM compliant eco-pacer type unit,which could do a similar job,but with much reduced running costs.
Love them or hate them, but the pacers at their time were made the way they were to keep running costs down.We need a modern day upgraded version still, to fill that niche.

 

[mmh]

The decision to scrap the pacres was not entirely TFW's making.
Ultimately the DFT gave the edict that all stock had to be PRM compliant by a set date,and there was a lot of can-kicking by all parties who should have either ordered new stock or made the necessary adjustments a lot sooner.

Having a 153 attached to a compliant unit would have doubled up on existing duties,thereby reducing the amount of operational trains in service,and reducing revenue generation due to excess capacity on those diagrams.
A lot of these branch services are run on a shoestring at best of times, hence the requirement for either the single 153 or pacer to start with.

Umm, non-compliant 153s were regularly worked with a compliant one on TFW after the deadline. The toilet on non-compliant units was locked out of use with a sign telling passengers to use another another one.

 

[Towers]

The decision to scrap the pacres was not entirely TFW's making.
Ultimately the DFT gave the edict that all stock had to be PRM compliant by a set date,and there was a lot of can-kicking by all parties who should have either ordered new stock or made the necessary adjustments a lot sooner.

Having a 153 attached to a compliant unit would have doubled up on existing duties,thereby reducing the amount of operational trains in service,and reducing revenue generation due to excess capacity on those diagrams.
A lot of these branch services are run on a shoestring at best of times, hence the requirement for either the single 153 or pacer to start with.

Somebody really did need to bite the bullet,and either get the 14x evolutions, or put in an order for a no-frills PRM compliant eco-pacer type unit,which could do a similar job,but with much reduced running costs.
Love them or hate them, but the pacers at their time were made the way they were to keep running costs down.We need a modern day upgraded version still, to fill that niche.

I couldn't agree more!

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 4 Jun 2022 ==

Umm, non-compliant 153s were regularly worked with a compliant one on TFW after the deadline. The toilet on non-compliant units was locked out of use with a sign telling passengers to use another another one.

This demonstrates the lack of common sense; as long as a PRM compliant facility is available on the train, there really is no reason why an existing non-PRM one needs to be locked out. No different to having a 2/3/4/5 car unit with one PRM and one or more non-PRM facilities.

 

[DorkingMain]

Agreed. If someone in a wheelchair wishes to use the toilet then they have only one door available on a class 150. If they have no need to use the toilet then a Pacer is no different. I have seen dozens of people in wheelchairs on Pacers over the years. By contrast, guess how many wheelchairs I have seen on compliant DOO rolling stock around London... How exactly is someone supposed to get on or off at an unstaffed station?

The treatment that disabled people get on DOO trains is atrocious and massively dubious in terms of equality legislation. It's not a good example to go by

 

[Bikeman78]

You will find there disabled seating area is in the same coach as the accessible toilet on a 150 & most rolling stock for that very reason, regarding the pacers they had no retention tanks fitted and had accessibility problems for disabled passengers. Plus pacers were life expired units and many were not in a good state of repair if you asked maintenance staff.

Simple solution for the toilets is to lock them out of use, which is exactly what happened for their last five months in traffic. As regards maintenance, no matter how bad they were, they still turned out reliability figures five times better than their replacements and not much worse than 150s.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 4 Jun 2022 ==

The treatment that disabled people get on DOO trains is atrocious and massively dubious in terms of equality legislation. It's not a good example to go by

I agree. If the government is remotely serious about making the network accessible then every train needs to have a guard or all stations on DOO routes need to be staffed from start to end of service.

 

[hooverboy]

Simple solution for the toilets is to lock them out of use, which is exactly what happened for their last five months in traffic. As regards maintenance, no matter how bad they were, they still turned out reliability figures five times better than their replacements and not much worse than 150s.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 4 Jun 2022 ==


I agree. If the government is remotely serious about making the network accessible then every train needs to have a guard or all stations on DOO routes need to be staffed from start to end of service.

I've seen plenty of DOO services in germany with wheelchair users going on/off quite happily.
The fact they have level boarding capable trains is an absolute game changer.GA users now have this luxury and it's really worth it's weight in gold!
Germany also put into law quite early on during WW2 reconstruction that all platforms would be uniform height.
Obviously not so easy for us as we still have a lot of victorian infrastructure made by various companies.However a rolling retrofit programme would be doable,just extremely expensive.

 

[Dai Corner]

I agree. If the government is remotely serious about making the network accessible then every train needs to have a guard or all stations on DOO routes need to be staffed from start to end of service.

Or maybe provide travelling assistants to accompany disabled solo passengers? I suspect that would be cheaper than guarding all trains or staffing all stations.